Beyond Form & Space

The Swedish composer and musician Catharina Backman’s instruments of preference are self-made of glass, as well as her beloved accordion. She studied composition at Malmö Academy of Music with Javier Alvarez, Hans Gefors, Rolf Martinsson and Kent Olofsson. Catharina has always had a strong affinity for music on stage and her work includes opera commissioned from among others The Royal Swedish Opera and Malmö Opera. Catharina is also strongly influenced by the theatre in her other compositions and her chamber music often contains visual and theatrical elements. Catharina Backman is currently composing chamber music for The TAKY Contemporary Ensemble and later this year theatre music to the Berthold Brecht play The Good Person of Szechwan. In 2012 Catharina was the artistic director of the Nordic Composers Council’s festival “Nordic Music Days”, hosted by The Swedish Composers Society in Stockholm.

At Operastorming #1 Catharina will explore the expanded possibilities of the operatic form, or lack of form. She is interested in the possibilities of using the sound itself and its relation to the musicians’ presence on stage, as a point of departure for an opera.